Assessing Spatial Processing Deficits in Cerebral Visual Impairment (CVI) Using Virtual Reality

使用虚拟现实评估脑视觉障碍 (CVI) 的空间处理缺陷

• 批准号: 9807307
• 负责人: Lotfi Merabet
• 金额: $ 22.61万
• 依托单位: MASSACHUSETTS EYE AND EAR INFIRMARY
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-09-01 至 2021-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9807307
• 关键词: Address; Adolescent; Age; Attention; Behavioral; Blindness; Cerebrum; Child; Clinical assessments; Color; Crowding; Development; Elements; Environment; Environmental Risk Factor; Eye; Eye Movements; Focus Groups; Goals; Impairment; Individual; Investigation; Measures; Outcome Measure; Participant; Pattern; Performance; Perinatal; Population; Positioning Attribute; Psychophysics; Reaction Time; Rehabilitation therapy; Research; Schools; Stimulus; Structure; Testing; Toy; United States; Vision; Visual; Visual Cortex; Visual Pathways; Visual impairment; Visuospatial; Walking; Work; base; behavioral study; design; gaze; improved; indexing; interest; novel; primary outcome; sample fixation; tool; virtual; virtual reality; visual performance; visual search; visual stimulus; working group

Project Summary The objective of the proposed research is to better characterize and understand functional vision processing deficits in cerebral/cortical visual impairment (CVI), the leading cause of congenital vision loss in the United States and developed world. Perinatal damage to developing visual pathways and structures leads to impaired visual spatial processing abilities, particularly in the setting of high environmental complexity and attention demands. Standard clinical assessments and traditional psychophysical stimuli fail to characterize these functional vision deficits due to their lack of ecological validity. To address this unmet need, we have developed a novel virtual reality (VR) based testing platform to assess visual spatial processing abilities in tasks that approach real world situations. In this cross-sectional behavioral study, performance in children and adolescents with CVI will be compared to age-matched ocular visual impaired (OVI) individuals as well as neuro-typical developed sighted controls. Using recorded eye tracking metrics, we will characterize visual search performance and the effect of manipulating stimulus factors in the VR environment. Our central hypothesis is that VR based assessment will reveal impairments in visual spatial processing that are not characterized by standard clinical assessments. In our first aim, we will compare visual spatial processing abilities using two VR based visual search tasks. The first is a static object visual search task (the “virtual toy box”) in which participants must search for a toy positioned in an array of distractor elements (other toys). The second is a dynamic object visual search task (the “virtual corridor”) in which participants must search for the principal of a school in a crowd of distractor elements (other individuals walking in a school corridor). In both tasks, visual search performance will be assessed by varying the number of surrounding distractor elements. We hypothesize that in contrast to individuals with OVI and sighted controls, CVI participants will show greater impairment in performance as a function of increasing visual task demands associated with environmental complexity. In the second aim, we will characterize the effect of manipulating environmental factors using the VR environment on spatial processing abilities. We hypothesize that compared to baseline performance, individuals with CVI will reveal improved performance when target saliency is enhanced, while manipulations that decrease overall target saliency and/or increase task complexity will be associated with impaired performance. The proposed work is of great significance given the potential for developing a novel and ecologically valid VR based platform that provides for superior assessment of visual functional deficits in individuals based on their type of visual impairment. Furthermore, this investigation will help lay the ground work for the creation of new adaptive tools and strategies designed for an individual's specific developmental and rehabilitative needs. This is of particular significance for individuals with CVI; a population that has been greatly underserved despite its important

项目摘要 该研究的目的是更好地描述和理解功能性视觉处理 大脑/皮质视力障碍（CVI）的缺陷，这是美国先天性视力丧失的主要原因， 国家和发达国家。围产期损害发育中的视觉通路和结构导致受损 视觉空间处理能力，特别是在高度复杂的环境和注意力 要求。标准的临床评估和传统的心理物理刺激无法表征这些 由于缺乏生态有效性，导致功能性视力缺陷。为了满足这一未满足的需求，我们 开发了一种新的基于虚拟现实（VR）的测试平台，以评估视觉空间处理能力， 接近真实的世界情况的任务。在这项横断面行为研究中，儿童和 将青少年CVI患者与年龄匹配的眼视力受损（OVI）患者进行比较， 神经典型的发达视力控制。使用记录的眼动跟踪指标，我们将描述视觉 搜索性能和在VR环境中操纵刺激因素的影响。我们的中央 假设基于VR的评估将揭示视觉空间处理中的损伤， 其特征在于标准临床评估。在我们的第一个目标中，我们将比较视觉空间处理 使用两个基于VR的视觉搜索任务。第一个是静态物体视觉搜索任务（“虚拟玩具 框”），其中参与者必须搜索位于干扰物元件阵列中的玩具（其他玩具）。的 第二个是动态物体视觉搜索任务（“虚拟走廊”），参与者必须搜索 在一群干扰元素中的学校校长（在学校走廊中行走的其他人）。无论是 任务，视觉搜索性能将通过改变周围干扰元素的数量来评估。 我们假设，与OVI和视力控制的个体相比，CVI参与者将表现出更大的 随着与环境相关的视觉任务需求的增加， 复杂性在第二个目标中，我们将描述操纵环境因素的影响， VR环境对空间处理能力的影响。我们假设与基线表现相比， 当目标显著性增强时，患有CVI的个体将显示出更好的表现，而操纵 降低总体目标显著性和/或增加任务复杂性将与受损的 性能拟议的工作是具有重要意义的潜力，开发一种新的和 生态有效的基于VR的平台，提供对视觉功能缺陷的上级评估， 根据个人的视力障碍类型。此外，这次调查将有助于奠定基础， 致力于创造新的适应性工具和策略，为个人的特定发展而设计。 和康复需求。这对于患有CVI的个体尤其重要;这是一个已经被 尽管其重要性，